El Tigre: Project Tigre
by Dreamer Red Streak
Summary: This comes directly after the first story in my Violin and Guitar story. El Tigre and his friends go on an adventure to India. Note; I don't own Marcus, he is an OC that belongs to Storyteller54. The other OC's i did create; Golden Lotus, Skull Panda, Dragonfly, Crystal Cheetah, Ice cat, Jade Leona, Rainbow Leopard, Sapphire Rhino,
1. Chapter 1

Frida, Marcus, and Manny were walking to the nearest ice-cream shop.

"Ever tried chili ice-cream?" Frida asked Marcus.

"Ummm…no, that sounds the opposite of good." He looked disgusted.

"WHAT?! No it's amazing; it's spicy but cold at the same time!" Manny exclaimed.

"Spicy ice-cream…." The black haired boy wasn't too sure about this.

"Ah you've got to try it! You have fire powers! Spicy should be nothin to you!" Frida continued excitedly.

Marcus was about to inform her breathing fire does not equal likening spicy foods, but suddenly a black car came speeding by, followed by a dozen cop cars blazing their sirens. The black car turned the corner and the cops followed. Manny was about to turn his belt, but an abrupt crash and the sound of several skidding cars stopped him. After the sounds stopped he activated his belt and they quickly ran towards the corner.

On the other side was one heck of a sight; A young woman stood with her arm slammed into the hood of the black car, creating a huge dent. The young woman had a hard metallic green lion mask and long mint green hair. Her eyes were a piercing gold, and her skin was the color of creamy coffee. She was wearing a outfit of multiple shades of green.

The young women slowly lift her arm up and walked over to the driver's side. With military like attitude she ripped the door off its hinges and pulled the driver out of the car, throwing him on the hard ground. The police quickly got out of their cars and cuffed the criminals. The young woman spotted El Tigre and gave him an up and down look. She started walking towards them.

"I think that lady has a bone too pic with you…" Marcus looked over at his tiger tailed friend.

The young woman stopped in fount of the 3 and looked at them for a moment before speaking.

"I presume you are the current El Tigre?" She asked.

"Yeah, and who are you?" Manny wasn't trying to be rude, but he didn't like the way she was acting.

"I am Jade Leona, an…" Marcus interrupted her.

"You're the chick who sent who sent that other chick to attack us!" Marcus snapped.

She looked like she had no idea what he was talking about.

"White Leopard tail and ears? White and black outfit?" Nova tried to jog Jade's memory.

"My old partner…I'm sorry about that, I wanted her to see if you were friend or foe, but it seems she decided to attack instead..." Jade apologized.

"Maybe you should get a new partner heh." Marcus chuckled.

"She is no longer my partner, she quit." She continued.

"Well, umm, nice to me you." Manny extended his hand for her to shake.

After shaking his hand she took of her mask, deactivating her super form. She was now wearing a black official looking jacket with gold buttons, a white tank top, and slick black pants with black motorcycle boots.

"I have come to ask for your assistance, El Tigre."

"You can call me Manny, and what did you need help with?" He raised a brow.

"In India's jungles, there is a man poaching animals on a scale never seen before, I need you to help me take him down." She explained

"Well umm, this generally isn't the kind of thing I do, why did you come to me?" He raised a brow.

"Because of this…" She pulled a very old looking scroll out of her bag and opened it up for them to see.

It was a contract stating that those who have sighed must help Jade Leo when needed, if he or she refuses then his or her magic item will lose its power. At the bottom was El Tigre signed, clear as day.

"Just because the first one signed it doesn't mean that applies to me." Manny shrugged.

"Actually…" Frida raised a finger nervously.

"My mom brings paper work home some times and I've picked up a few things from her about contracts. It's sighed as El Tigre not whatever the heck his real name was, so that means whoever currently takes that identity is bound to the contract." Frida smiled triumphantly at her own show of intelligence.

"Well it looks like you have to now." Marcus laughed.

"Errr, I'm gonna have to go tell my dad…. And my mom…"

"I expected that." Jade stated.

They started to head to Manny's house.

"I want to go with him too, sounds like a good adventure." Marcus asked.

"I only have enough money for my ticket and his…" Jade stated.

"I can scrounge up some cash for a ticket." The black haired boy explained.

"I would appreciate the assistance."

"I want to go too!" Frida wined.

"Have fun convincing your father." Manny scoffed.

Frida pouted, that would be a difficult task.

 **At the Rivera house;**

Rodolfo was reading the contract to see if his son really had to half away around the world.

"Well Miho, it seems you're going to have to go." He took off his glass's.

"BRING ME BACK A SOUVENIR WHILE YOU'RE THERE!" Grandpapi yelled from somewhere else in the house.

"I'll text mom."

It seemed like in only a few moments the door slammed open and Maria was in her platinum form and holding a big bag of items. Marcus fell of his chair from the shock.

"Manny! You're going to India!?" She took off the glove and dropped it on the floor.

"Y…yes…" Manny was a little freaked out at the sudden arrival of his mother.

"Well I got you some stuff to keep you safe!" Her mother held up the bag.

"Oh no…" Manny cringed.

"First up I have tiger repellent, elephant dart gun, a big bottle of sanitizer, anti-botfly shampoo, and an expert med kit…" She continued.

"Ok, ok, I'll take the med kit if it will make you stop talking." Manny grabbed the kit. (zootopia reference)

"Kid, you'll want the shampoo, trust me." Jade chimed in.

"Ok, but that's all!" Manny took the shampoo as well.

"Oh, you be careful miho!" Maria hugged her son and kissed him on the head, embarrassing somewhat.


	2. Chapter 2

"Where is he?" Manny looked at the clock in the lobby, if he didn't get to the plane soon it would take off without him.

It was about 8:50 in the morning, the plane to India took off at 9:00. He was waiting for Marcus, who was cutting it a little closer than Manny would like. Manny didn't normally worry about being late for things, but this was a **plane** , it wasn't going to wait for them. Frida still wasn't there ether. He had sent her text asking if she was coming or not, but she still hadn't responded. Through all the bustling people he saw Marcus's familiar face appear, with Jade Leona following right behind.

"Sorry for taking so long, it's really hard to get a sword through security…" Marcus stated, half chuckling a little bit.

Though relieved that Marcus made it, he quickly changed his focus;

"Did you see Frida?"

"Ah, young love…" Marcus pretended to swoon.

"Marcus!" Manny snapped

"Nope, haven't seen or heard from her since yesterday."

"I'm sorry, but we can't wait for her, we need to get going." Jade interrupted

"Maybe we can wait till the next plane…" Manny asked sadly.

"The next plane isn't for another 6 hours, and every moment we spend here an innocent animal is killed. We must go, I am sorry." She stated sternly, but not without compassion.

Manny sighed and took one more sad look at the entrance to the waiting area before he and the other 2 headed to board the plane.

They put their small bags into the overhead compartments and then sat down.

Manny leaned back in his chair and sighed sadly.

"What's wrong with you?" Marcus asked.

"I just really wished Frida could have come, she would have loved to go to another country…" Manny sighed sadly.

"True…among other things…" Marcus switched from sad to snickering.

"What are you implying?" Manny raised a brow.

"Nothing, nothing at all…Just this would be really fun for you two is all." Marcus snickered.

"Well yeah, she's my best frenGet your mind out of the gutter!" Manny hissed quietly as his faced heated up with the realization of what Marcus was implying.

"I was half expecting you to actually hiss like a cat." Marcus laughed as he buckled his seat belt.

Manny buckled his seat belt, feeling a little more nervous than before. He didn't like flying on planes, a little too far from the ground for his comfort. He was fine jumping from building to building, he wasn't that high above the ground and he was in control. The plane they were in was a smaller one; it was going to a small town named Kota Singa that didn't get many tourists. It had the closest landing plat form to the facility that Jade Leona worked for, and the residents of the town were mostly the families of the facility workers.

The plane began to take off, Manny put his ear buds in and lisoned to music to relax a little bit. After a few minutes the passengers were allowed to get up and walk around. Randomly he felt what he figured to be a magazine on his head. He looked at Marcus to see why he was doing that, but Marcus was looking at a travel guide of Kota Singa. He tried to move his head away from the object, but a hand held it in place. He grabbed the magazine away and turned to look at the seat behind him. His irritated expression turned into a smile like a happy dog. It was Frida.

"I thought you didn't make it!" Manny smiled as she walked around from the isle behind him.

"I wanted to surprise you guys, I actually got here earlier and hid until you guys went on the plane, then I boarded after you." She smiled happily.

"I see you have found more fight efficient cloths…" Jade Leona stated from her seat across from them.

Frida was wearing her hair up, she was wearing shorts with an old baseball shirt, and hiking boots.

"Niiiiiice!" Marcus smiled flirtatiously.

"Don't make me slap you." Frida stated with an annoyed tone.

"Sorry."

"I had to wear something else! I love my skirt and all, but I can't go chasing poachers in the jungles of India wearing a skirt." She explained.

"I'm just amazed your dad let you come!" Manny added.

"Dude, it took like 3 hours of convincing to get him to cave and let me come, and then after all that we had to convince the principle it was ok if I missed school. It's a good thing your mom works at our school." Frida continued.

"Well I'm glad you came, I hoping I was going to get to see you in a belly dancing outfit." Marcus winked.

"I plan on buying one, but not for the reasons you are thinking of." She gently hit him on the head with a rolled up magazine.

"So Jade, are any of your other family members also super heroes…or super villains?" Manny asked her.

"Well, my grandfather is still a very powerful man despite giving me the mask, and my mom has belt that gives her super strength. She is called the "Sapphire Rhino." She answered while working on a tablet.

"Is she married?" Marcus chimed in, smiling at what he knew was about to happen;

"Dude!?" Manny snapped at the black haired boy (he does have black hair…right?)

"And my father is a scientist from Ireland." She continued.

"Are there any other super hero's at the place you work for?" Frida asked with a smile.

"Yes, but I figure you can meet them when we get there."


	3. Chapter 3

The plane landed at the Kota Singa airport and the four of them got off the plane and headed towards the exit of the building. It was hot and muggy outside with little shops on either side of a long the dirt road that headed into the jungle; it reminded Manny of an old western town.

"My partner is here somewhere with our ride to the facility. You 3 can look around the shops while I try to find him." Jade Leona stated as she headed off towards what looked like the mailstop.

Frida and Manny went into what looked like a little antique/gift shop, Marcus followed Jade. The little shop was filled with many hand painted statues and pottery, and many wooden animal mask's.

"I promised my sisters I would get them a souvenir, see anything they might like?" Frida asked him as she looked at a strange statue.

"I don't really know them that well..." Manny replied as he fixed his attention on an old looking wooden tiger mask.

"Should I get this?" Manny chuckled holding the mask up.

"Definitely, it would be a sin if you didn't! It's far too perfect!" Frida laughed.

Frida noticed a black wooden box, she didn't know why, but she felt extremely draw to it. She walked closer to the shelf it was seated on; it was covered in strange red markings, it almost seemed like it was calling to her.

"Frida?" Manny lightly shook her shoulder, snapping her out of the trance.

"Uh, what?"

"Are you alright? You kind of zoned out there…" Manny tilted his head in worry.

"Yeah, I just decided what I'm going to get…." She smiled.

Outside Jade and Marcus just left the mail shop.

"So…would you be interested in dating anyone by any chance?" Marcus had been trying to flirt, but she seemed not to notice.

"Not really, no."

"Oh…ok then…" Marcus frowned, but remembered something and smiled again.

"So…how many girls our age are at the reserve?" He asked, pretending to be nonchalant

Jade was about to answer, but the sound of yelling interrupted her. A man was thrown out of an alleyway, a short teen jumped out of the alleyway after him, landing on the ground in a cat like manor. The teen stood up, he/she had short and fluffy blond hair, a padded yellow and black catsuit with a white belly. His or her eyes were brown, and he/she had a tail like cheetah. The man scrambled to get up, but the kid swung kicked him back down.

"Eric?!" Jade shouted at the kid.

The kid turned his attention to Leona, his expression quickly turned into a very happy grin. The man saw this and used the opportunity to kick the blond haired kid in the cheek, sending him stumbling backwards into a group of barrels. Marcus was about to help the kid but Jade beat him to it; she swipe kicked him and he landed face first into the dirt, she held him down with her boot and turned her attention to Eric;

"What did he do, Eric?" Leo asked.

"He has an ivory necklace; it's in his left jacket pocket!" Eric stated.

"Get me some rope; I doubt he will show me the ivory willingly…" She told the kid.

"Already on it!" Marcus threw her a round of rope.

Leona tied up the man's hands and then flipped him on his back; she searched his left pocket and pulled out a pendent that was clearly the tip of a tusk. It had a strange mark burned into the side of it.

"You are a poacher, here to spy on us I take it?" she raised a brow and spoke in a tone that was both calm and intimidating.

By this time Manny and Frida heard the commotion and came outside.

"What the hell is going on out here?" Manny tilted his head.

"This blond kid over here found a spy and now he's being arrested." The black haired boy explained nonchalantly, crossing his arms in a board manor.

"Of course you have all the fun." Frida pouted.

"Well…you and I could have a little fu…." Marcus was interrupted by her flicking him in the forhead.

"OW!"

"That's what you get for being a perv!"

"Oh how could I not make that joke, it was far too easy, and you walked right into it!" he laughed.

A few people had come out of a building and were taking the man away, probably to the local police station. Jade walked over to our 3 hero's with Eric following close behind.

"This is my partner, Eric." She introduced him, and he waved shyly.

"Wait, he's the one driving us to the reserve, he's like 12!" Marcus raised a brow in concern.

"Actually I'm 15, and Jade will be the one driving." Eric corrected lightly.

"Oh…" Marcus didn't mean to be rude, but the kid was really short for 15.

"I take it that you are El Tigre?" the blond kid asked as he pointed at Manny's belt.

"Yup!" Manny smiled proudly.

"Well it's nice to meet you, and what about you two?" Eric changed his attention to Marcus and then Frida.

"Well my names Frida, I don't have any powers but I got a mean left hook!" She smiled proudly.

"And I'm Marcus, I have pyrokinesis and a sword." He smiled.

"Well nice to meet you two!" Eric shook their hands and smiled happily.

"Anyways, we should get going, the jeep is right over there!" He pointed over at a dark green jeep parked next to a market building.

Their luggage was in the back of the mail truck that was going to the facility as well. Eric tossed the keys over to Jade as they headed to the car, Manny jumped in shotgun and the other 3 sat in the back.

"So Eric, where do come from?" Frida asked.

"Maine, but my family comes from Germany, were Jewish." Eric stated and Jade drove out of town and headed down a jungle road.

"Oh, do you have any sibli…" Frida was interrupted by Marcus;

"Frida, where did you get that box?"

"Err, that little gift shop…why?" Frida leaned away from in confusion and worry.

"It's got one funky magic aura around it, that's why…"

"Ah COME ON! Can't I have ONE cool item that doesn't have a demon or some freaky thing attached to it?" Frida yelled in a slightly humorous tone.

"It's not a demon…well, not likely not…It's got a lot of strange intertwining magic. There are so many tightly mixed I can't identify them…" Marcus trailed off as she handed him the box.

"Oh, well that's just lovely, I bought a demonic hell chest!" Frida groaned.

"I'll try and figure it out when we get to the facility and have some free time." Marcus continued.

Manny just seemed to be enjoying looking at the jungle around him, like he felt a connection with it.

"It's a really beautiful jungle, isn't it?" Eric pointed out

Light shown down on the path below, a few brightly colored birds could be seen flying overhead.

"Yeah…" Manny smiled softly, clearly relaxed.

The dirt road opened up to what looked like a classic zoo. The "zoo" had watch towers at each corner, likely for use at night. They could hear the loud calls of many animals. The gate was tall and intimidating. Jade smiled before speaking;

"Welcome to the Kota Singa sanctuary!"


	4. Chapter 4

As the jeep got closer the two people on the tower saw Jade and opened the gates. As the jeep drove inside they could see a tall blue building that looked like of like a motel a bit. There was a one building that looked like the mess hall, another building that was likely storage, and a lot filled with jeeps and trucks. Past the buildings were cages, likely filled with animals. Jade turned the jeep and parked in the lot, the mail truck stopped next to a building. The hero's got out of the jeep and went to the mail truck to get their luggage. The truck driver waved to Eric and spoke;

"Hey Eric, you got package from home!" The man started walking to the back of the truck.

"I bet mom sent some snicker doddles!" Eric ran over excitedly to get the box.

He quickly grabbed the box, passing by Marcus to get to it. Marcus swore he saw an "a" at the end of Eric but he shook it off. After they grabbed their luggage Jade spoke;

"I'll take you to your rooms; you do have roommates by the way." Jade instructed.

Jade led them to the blue building; each of the doors had numbers on them like a hotel. They headed up the stairs and to the 2nd floor and Jade stopped in front of room 15.

"Marcus, Manny, this is your room. You two have two roommates. I think you two get the bunk beds farthest from the door. Here are your keys." She handed the two boys separate keys, each on leather string like a necklace.

"Frida you are in room 20, it's right on the end. You have two roommates, I do believe that you get one of the bunks closet to the door. Here's your key. If any of you need me, my room is 30 though I likely won't be there." Jade spoke fast and then left.

"Well, I guess I will see you two later…" Frida said reluctantly. She was sort of expecting to be a little closer to her friends, so she was a bit reluctant to leave them. But off she went to meet her roommates. Marcus was about to unlock the door, but the knob turned an opened, startling the other two. A tall young Chinese man was on the other side; he had pink eyes and long straight black hair. He had a silver medallion around his neck that had a cat's paw print craved in it. He was a little older than Jade, but not by much.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to startle you. I take it you two are our new roommates?" The man tilted his head slightly; his hair had a purple shine to it.

"Um yeah, I'm Manny, and this is Marcus." Manny tried to recompose himself.

"Well it's nice to meet you, I'm Bingwen." Bingwen smiled and let the two in.

The room was bigger than most motels, and it looked a lot like a hotel room mixed with a cabin; the walls were simple wood and there was a simple hanging lamp. Next to the front door there was a bathroom. There was a table in the middle of the room with 4 chairs. In one chair sat a Polynesian boy, about their age. He had purple hair in a man bun, his eyes were bright yellow. He had a yellow and green gantlet on his right wrist. It had a purple dragonfly craved into it. He tilted his head at Manny and Marcus curiously. There were Uno cards sprawled out on the table.

"I'll be right back; I have to go check something." Bingwen quickly left, closing the door behind him.

Manny and Marcus were left there, it was a little awkward. The boy decided to speak up;

"Umm, hi, I'm Eloni…." The boy smiled shyly.

"I'm Marcus." Marcus smiled awkwardly.

"and I'm Manny"

"Bing forgot if he wrote down something about the big cat's vitamins today." Eloni added.

There was another awkward silence before Marcus spoke up abruptly;

"I call the top bunk." The black haired boy stated abruptly.

"What?! No, you can't just call that! We weren't even talking about it!" Manny turned quickly with an amazed/annoyed expression on his face.

"Yeah, I can."

"No you can't!"

"Just did." Marcus smirked.

Eloni chuckled at the two's bickering.

"Want to play some Uno?" He asked happily.

Marcus and Manny stopped their arguing and turned their attention to Eloni. The two shared a glance of agreement and nodded before walking over to the table.

 **Back with Frida.**

* * *

Frida turned the door knob and opened the door. Inside she was greeted with the same room as her two friends. Inside a Chinese girl with short straight white and black stripped hair was dancing. The girl was about Frida's age. The girl stopped and looked at Frida abruptly. The girl had black eye shadow encircling her eyes, like a panda, it looked like there was a thin coat of gold glitter eye gel over the black. She wore a head band that resembled panda ears and a white tank top with a panda logo on it, pink shorts with black combat boots. She also had light pink lip gloss, and her right shoulder to her elbow was covered in tattoos of cute things like pandas and pink roses. She seemed like she didn't belong somewhat.

"Are you our new roommate?" The girl spoke in a friendly tone, she had an elegant voice.

"Uhh yeah, I'm Frida…" Frida snapped out of her daze of the strange girl.

"I'm Chen." The girl introduced herself and shook Frida's hand.

"And this is Samaira." Chen pointed towards the upper left bunk, where a girl appeared to be sleeping.

Frida didn't even notice the girl on the bunk at first, it startled her a little bit. The girl was Indian and had long bubblegum pink straight hair, and she was wearing shorts with a pink t-shirt.

"Is she sleeping?" Frida asked quietly.

"No, she's just too tired to sit up while she meditates. That isn't even her bed, but she spilled water on her's earlier, so she's lying on mine until her mattress dry's." Chen explained.

"oh..." Frida mouthed.

Sama spoke but didn't open her eyes.;

"Welcome Frida, it is nice to meet you." She had a smooth and calm voice.

"Nice to meet you too!" Frida smiled.

"So you got any powers?" Chen asked as she sat at the little table.

"Nope, but a baseball bat. What about you?" Frida responded.

"Just my fists and my ability to wink in the face of danger." Chen smiled proudly and chuckled.

"So…what can we do until dinner?"

"Well, I can teach you a few dance moves, or I can show you the animals on site?" Chen offered.

"Dance for now, it looks like it might ran and I don't want to get caught in a down pour." Frida responded.

"All right then, let's see what you got!" Chen grabbed her radio and turned it on, but not so loud that the neighbors could hear.

* * *

 **With Jade in the Lion enclosure;**

"Jade, he isn't doing well...and nether is Feather..." An African lady in blue told the Lion girl.

"If that bastard hadn't shot him, then they would be...I'll get that son of bitch if i have to search the end of the world..." Jade growled.

The woman hugged Jade and patted her back in a comforting manner.

 **In Eric's room;**

* * *

Eric pulled a dress out of the box and held it up, a very apparent look of discomfort on his face. It was a short pretty lacy dress with short sleeves, it was such a light pink it was almost white. He put it back in the box and laid back on his bed, he held a pillow over his face and groaned loudly in frustration.


	5. Chapter 5

It was a little after 5:00, so the 4 boys headed for the mess hall. The mess hall kind of looked like a school cafeteria if it was made of wood like a log cabin. At the end of the room was a lunch room styled food table, with a lady walking behind the tables in the corner sitting on a stool. The lady was reading a book while eating an apple. The was a black board in front of the line that stated the special of the day.

"What does it mean by the special?" Manny asked Eloni.

"Well every meal has the same foods except for the special, which is something different that is made every once in a while. Today's special is vegan beef and broccoli stir-fry." The purple haired boy explained.

"Oh…is vegan beef good?" Manny looked a bit concerned.

"Well I like it, but it depends on whether you like teriyaki beef." Eloni shrugged.

"I guess it won't hurt to try a bit…" Manny said a little uneasy.

"So is all the food here vegan?" Marcus asked, a little more concerned.

"Not all of it, but a lot of the food is vegan friendly because the majority of people here ether vegetarians or vegans." Bingwen chimed in.

"Oh" Marcus mouthed the word silently.

So the boys went and got there food; Marcus got a baked potato, chicken, and a biscuit. Manny got chicken, fried rice, a bit of that veggie beef, and a biscuit. They went and sat at a round table near the entrance. They could hear the rain pounding on the roof outside.

"I honestly wasn't expecting food this nice…I was expecting army food." Marcus stated.

"The people in charge of this place wanted healthy but cheap food, and that's what this stuff is." Bingwen explained.

"Oh…where do you get the money for this place from?" Marcus asked.

"Well donations, a gem mine nearby, and we have a very rich sponcer who loves helping animals." Eloni chimed in.

"That's funny, normally rich people are stingy and spoiled." Manny chuckled.

"Well he used to be like that, but his house caught on fire once and he was saved by a stray dog, now he it's like he's a different man." Eloni continued.

"Well that's cool..." Marcus chimed in.

It was at that time that the girls walked into the door; Lotus had and umbrella, but Frida and Chen were soaking wet, clearly loving the rain. The girls ran and got their food before sitting with the boys.

"Wow, you're soaked!" Manny laughed at Frida.

"Yeah, it's raining cats and dogs out their!" Frida stated happily as she wolfed down some fried rice.

"Greeeeeat, now I'm gonna get drenched when we leave." Manny groaned in annoyance.

"Wow, you really are a cat through and through." Marcus mocked.

"Actually tigers like water." Jade suddenly stated from behind the fire boy, scaring the hell out him.

"Where the crap did you come from?!" Marcus snapped, clearly startled.

"I came in through the back, it was closer." She sat down at the table with nothing but a biscuit, clearly not going to stay long.

"So…how did you get your magical mask?" Frida turned and asked the mint haired girl.

"It's been in my family for generations, my grandfather gave it to me when he felt he was too old." Jade stated coolly.

"Cool! My Tigre belt has been in my family for generations!" Manny chimed in.

"I thought it might, there were no records on where it might have been hidden, so it only made sense that it was still in the hands of the Rivera's." Jade responded.

Eric suddenly came running through the door, clearly trying to avoid getting wet. It was clear that his Cheetah ability's definitely gave him advanced speed, though Rodolfo could definitely beat him. He ran past the table and got some food before sitting next to Jade. The table was getting rather crowded…

"So Eric how is your family?" Leona asked.

"They're good; mom's bakery is doing well! She sent some snicker doodles, here have some!" Eric opened his satchel and pulled out a ziplock bag filled with cookies and set it on the table.

Eric handed one to Jade who took it and then stood up;

"Sorry, but I'm rather busy today, I have to get back to work see you back at our room."

"Ok, good luck with that Rhino!" Eric waved, though he clearly looked disappointed.

The blond boy turned back to see Marcus giving him an almost jealous look.

"What?" Eric tilted his head in confusion.

"How come you get a room with a girl? Why couldn't I get a room with a girl?" Marcus sighed with annoyance.

"Cause you're a perv, that's why!" Frida would have gently wacked him, but he was directly across from her.

"Well you can hang out with me any time you like, sugar." Chen winked at Marcus/

Marcus was taken aback by this; he wasn't normally the one being flirted with. Manny was wide eyed and turned to his friend and spoke;

"Date her! She is the only woman who's ever going to go out with you!" Manny spoke with urgency, clearly for comedic affect.

This earned him an annoyed look by Marcus and laughs from the others.

"Chen, aren't you going to have a cookie?" Frida asked her new friend.

"I can't, cinnamon gives me a sore throat." The white haired girl responded.

"So…What are your powers?" Marcus asked Chen.

"None, I my sister got snow leopard powers, so I trained and became a fighter to help her. I really like panda's, so I call myself the "Skull Panda." and make myself look like one" Chen explained coolly.

"Who's you're sister?" Manny responded.

"Well she was the "Ice Cat." But she quit and went to a life of crime recently."

"By chance, did she have short white hair and bright blue eyes? Wears a gray and white outfit?" Marcus asked

"Yeah, you know her?"

"Yeah, she kicked our asses." Manny responded with an annoyed expression.

"Sorry." Chen chuckled a little bit.

"So, what are your powers and where did you get them from pinky?" Marcus asked Lotus, who hadn't interacted much so far.

"I telekinetically control plants, and I don't want to talk about it." Lotus spoke quick and firm, though with an elegance to her voice.

"Ok, what about you?" He asked Eloni.

"I am the "Dragonfly" I found this magic gantlet in a cave on my island, it immediately latched on to my wrist and now I got super powers! My suit has wings and I have wrist lasers and advanced agility. " the purple haired boy responded happily.

"Cool!" Frida high fived the boy, almost smacking somebody in the face in the process.

"What are your powers, Bingwen?" Manny asked the long haired boy.

"I have this medallion, it turns me into the "Rainbow Leopard" and it gives me cat like ability's." Bingwen smiled and took a drink of his water.

"Man, why are there so many cat super heroes?" Marcus stated with a tab bit of confusion.

"Jade's grandmother will likely know, she's a historian on the history of supers. She lives here now in order to watch over the animals, you should ask her later." Eric chimed in.

"I would think you would know…." Marcus raised a brow in confusion.

"I keep meaning to ask, but then I get busy and forget to…" Eric replied.

"So how did you get your necklace? That's the thing your powers come from right?" Manny asked the blond haired boy.

"Oh! It was a gift from my grandmother, she travelled to Africa when she was younger and found it and brought it back. Then she gave it to me on my 13th birthday and I figured out that it was magical and then I got into some trouble and Jade found out about me. She came and recruited me and she's been my best friend ever since!" Eric smiled sweetly.

"So, how did you get your belt?" Bingwhen chimed in.

"Long story short I found it in the attic of my grandfather's childhood house." Manny stated.

"That's it? No big adventure of self-discovery or something like that?" Marcus looked at his friend is confusion and slight annoyance.

"No, that's it."

"Wow, your backstory is as boring as dirt."

Manny rolled his eyes and Frida laughed.

"After dinner I'll take you to meet Jade's mother, she really wants to meet you 3!" Eric chimed in.

* * *

 **In case you were wondering the food that is fixed each day on the facility (they seemed like healthy and cheap foods);**

 **Dinner;**

 **Baked Potato's**

 **Chicken**

 **Broccoli**

 **Vegan Chicken.**

 **Mixed veggy's**

 **Corn**

 **Biscuits**

 **Salad**

 **Fried Rice**

 **Baked Beans.**

 **Lunch (dinner lacked fruit so here it is XD)**

 **Fruit mix**

 **Toast**

 **Uncooked mixed veggys.**

 **Watermelon slices.**

 **Blueberry jam**

 **Strawberry jam.**

 **Breakfast.**

 **Peach Oatmeal**

 **Egg patty's (like for breakfast sandwiches).**

 **Toast**

 **Blueberry jam**

 **Strawberry jam.**

 **Bagels**

 **Vegan cream cheese (not cheap, but let me have my fun XD)**

 **Drinks (all day served)**

 **Coffee**

 **Apple juice**

 **Water**

 **I realize that I might be giving a "too good to be true" kind of air around the facility, I'm not trying too. I didn't mean to make the place seem overly nice; it's just there are plenty of nice foods that are cheap, and I hear army food isn't as bad as people give it credit for. And the house's they live in are not that nice, they just look that way. The facility's main concern is on the animals, they wouldn't waste the money on decorations. AND a lot of the food is grown nearby (with the assist of Lotus)**


	6. Chapter 6

**Sorry that this took my so long...blame Transformers Animated, i was watching a lot of episodes XD**

* * *

After dinner Eric took our 3 hero's to the area of the faculty wear the animals were kept, they were going to go meet Jade near the Rhino enclosures. The encloser was made to be very strong and resilient; Rhinos are rather strong creatures after all. The fencing was so thick and close together that it was difficult to see inside, there were warning signs posted all around the area. Out of nowhere Jade jumped over the fence followed by an older yet shorter African woman. Something on the other side rammed the fence, Manny figured it was likely the rhino. Jade handed an empty syringe to a staff member. The African woman had her hair up in a blue bandanna and she wore a blue outfit that was clearly a super suit. The body suit was sleeveless with shorts, she had a thick adventures vest and combat boots.

The woman turned to look at the 3.

"Oh, you must be Manny, Marcus, and Frida! My daughter has told me nice things about you." The woman smiled happily. Her way of talking reminded Manny of his mother a bit.

"Well, thank you." Manny smiled politely.

"Wait…who's your daughter?" Marcus tilted his head slightly.

"Oh, Jade is my daughter! I wonder why people are always so surprised by that…?"

"Well, she's so stoic…and like a foot taller than you…" Marcus said, very clearly surprised.

"She's tall like her daddy." The woman said sweetly, gently patting Jade's shoulder in a parental manor.

"My name is Masika (mah-SEE-kah) by the way, so you don't have to keep calling me 'Jades mom'." She chuckled, she seemed like a very sweet woman.

"Though, she has been giving the nickname 'Mama' around here." Eric chirped up.

"Anyways, I've got a job for you, Manny." Jade chimed into the conversation.

"What kind of job?" Manny tilted his head in curiosity.

"Follow me, you too Frida and Marcus." The green haired girl stated as she turned and started to walk towards another enclosure.

"You see, those who have powers that stem from animal oriented magic's have a much greater ability to connect with them, especially those of the same species." Jade explained.

"What?" Marcus raised a brow in confusion.

"You're gonna have to give us the boiled down version…" Frida added, just as confused.

"If you have animal powers, you are less likely to be attacked by animals, and animals of the same species are far more likely to understand you." Masika added.

"So i can talk to animals!?" Manny asked excitedly.

"Not exactly, not with words anyways…" She continued.

"It's more like, feeling the others emotions I guess…it's hard to describe….you've probably done it with house cat's before without even knowing it." Eric chimed in.

"Well I hope he hasn't don…" Marcus's dirty joke was interrupted by Frida smacking her hand over his mouth, clearly she seeing the joke from a mile away.

"Do I need to be in my El Tigre form?" Manny asked.

"It would be best." Jade responded.

Manny switched to his Tigre form and they all walked up to a metal fenced enclosure, a cheetah sat on a rock. It didn't pay any attention to our hero's until it saw jade, then it happily pranced over to her.

"Hi there pretty girl." 3 Jade knelt down the pet the purring creature through the fence.

The 3 were a little surprised at her sudden change in tone.

"I guess you got a soft spot for that one, huh?" Manny chimed in.

"I love cheetah's." She answered as she pet the creature, not really paying attention to anything else.

Marcus elbowed Eric and winked at him about her statement. The blond boy's face turned bright pink and he looked away embarrassedly.

"Her name is Mimi, but she's not the cat we are here to see." Jade walked past the Cheetah's cage to one next to it.

Manny's eyes widened at a large tiger siting underneath a bush, it had one golden eye that seemed like it could see right into people's souls.

"This Black Jack, you're going to get in the cage with him." Jade said bluntly.

"I'm gonna what?!" Manny abruptly peeled his eyes of the tiger and snapped his attention towards Jade.

"You need to master this skill, and the only way to do it is by practice." The mint hared girl continued.

"It can bite my arm off!"

"Don't be such a baby, you've been through worse." Marcus mocked at the curly haired boy.

The Marcus leaned close to Manny and whispered;

"Besides, it might impress Frida if you can pull it off..." Then he leaned back and smirked at the tiger boy, who was blushing while also looking quite annoyed.

"Fine, I guess I'll give it a shot." Manny huffed and climbed over the fence.

" _Anything to impress the girl..."_ Marcus snickered to himself.

* * *

The enclosure was a little bigger than the size of his living room. (his living room seemed kind of big in the show) Manny slid over the top of the fence and landed gracefully on the ground, the tiger took notice and watched him carefully. The back of the enclosure had lots of brush and small tree's.

"Hehe, nice kitty…." El Tigre chuckled nervously.

"Stop that, animals can sense your fear and it will agitate them." Jade instructed bluntly from the outside.

"I'm not scared!" Manny snapped defensively

"Were not that stupid dude, you're shaken like a leaf." Marcus chuckled from outside.

"Well, most of us anyways…" Frida smirked, side eyeing the demonic boy.

"HEY!" Marcus snapped.

Tigre would have snickered if he wasn't so concerned with the large predatory animal in front of him. His body froze when the creature slowly stood up. Black Jack slowly walked towards the nervous boy; the tiger seemed curious, which seemed like a good sign.

"H..hi there Black Jack…" Manny tried to stay calm; he wasn't sure why this creature freaked him out so much, he's faced far more dangerous situations than this.

The tiger stopped a few feet in front of him and tilted its head curiously. It made a strange Pfffff noise at him; it seemed like a friendly noise.

"Well he seems like he likes you, Tigers make that noise as a way of saying hello." Masika chirped up from the other side of the fence.

It was at this moment that Manny made a mistake; he locked eyes with Black Jack. Manny suddenly felt twice as much fear; he could swear those eyes were staring straight into his soul. The tiger sensed something was wrong and growled. Manny began to back up, which was his second mistake. Black Jack charged aggressively, Manny quickly scrambled up the fence and outside the enclosure. Marcus and Frida back away from the fence to avoid the claws of the tiger as he smashed into the fence.

* * *

El Tigre started to calm down now that he was outside the cage, Jade walked over to him with an unreadable expression.

"Sorry…I don't know why he freaked me out so much…" Manny's ears drooped a little bit

"It's ok, Black Jack has that effect on people." Jade stated.

Marcus looked at the large cat, who was now walking back to his bush. "He is a pretty big tiger, dang he must eat a lot…"

"Yes, yes he does." Eric responded.

Jade's mom looked over at the sunset; it was starting to get dark out. "It's getting kind of late; perhaps you should head back to your rooms for the night. You're probably tired from that plane ride." She smiled.

"Well I'm not really tired, but I need to call my dad. I promised him I would call each day. .." Frida responded.

"Ether way you'll need your rest, I'll be testing your fighting skill's tomorrow." The mint haired girl added. Then she turned around and began to walk away, Eric closely following.

"Ok, well I got to check on the animals in the vet center, have a good night." And with that Masika left the three.

"Well I guess we should head back to our room's…" Marcus stated.

Manny and Frida nodded.

* * *

The three started to walk back to the building; Frida had gotten out her phone and was currently talking to her parents. Her father sounded worried, while her mother seemed curious. Those two really made a perfect pair; Emiliano is protective while Carmela is patient. The two balance each other out.

"Ok, I guess we'll let you go now, be careful." Carmela stated from the speaker.

"I will Mom, love you!" Frida responded.

"Love you too, bye!" Both parents could be heard saying.

Frida hung up and put her phone away.

* * *

The 3 were only a few feet from the steps of the building when Marcus spoke up.

"I wonder why they have armed guards…" He was looking towards a tower that was in the corner of the facility, a man stood at the top with padded cloths and a gun of some kind.

"It because of the Tiger Slayer." Chen suddenly said from behind them, scaring the heck out of the 3.

Chen burst out laughing; she clearly didn't mean to scare them, she tried to apologize to them between her fits of laughter.

"S..s..sorry! I t..though you…" _* laughter*_ "Ok, I thought you knew I was there! My shadow was well with in your peripheral! (bigcatdereck reference!) Sorry!" She chuckled as her fit of laughter came to an end.

"It's ok, wow you can be quite when you want to!" Marcus responded, still a little startled.

"Anyways, who is the tiger slayer?" Frida asked.

"He's the leader of the poacher group that's hunting animals on an extreme scale. He sometimes attacks our transport trucks, were afraid he might attack this place directly. That's why we have the armed guards." The white haired girl answered.

"Wow, he sounds messed up." Marcus responded.

"Yeah…anyways goodnight, I'm going to go do some exercises before bed." Chen waved before turning and heading towards the back of the housing building.

The three headed for their rooms. Once Frida got to her room she sat at the table and began wrighting something down in her journal. Once Manny and Marcus got back to their room the tiger boy laid back on his bunk, resting and thinking. Marcus grabbed the chest and headed for the door.

"Where are you going?" Manny asked curiously.

"I'm going to the roof to see what's up with this chest's wonky aura." He said.

"Don't forget your room card, cause I will **not** let you back in." Manny chuckled a bit

"I got it."

"And try not to release any demons upon the world."

"No promises."

"Fair enough."


	7. Chapter 7

Marcus sat on the "apartment" roof, concentrating on the strange box. Invisible ribbons of different colored magic's swirled around the box, like glowing snakes. The magic definitely was coming from inside the box, but when he opened it the magic would disappeared immediately. It was a confusion box indeed.

* * *

 ***In the training house.***

The punching bag received a powerful punch from a pink gloved fist. Chen was training, punching with all her might. She was the only one in the training room; it would be dead quite if not for the loud bangs of her fist agenst the sand bag. The training house was rectangular with a rest room next to the hallway that leads to the door. She was very focused…until the sound of the front door closing snapped her out of it. She stopped and stood for a moment, sweaty and resting. She watched the hallway, but nobody came into the room. Did somebody change their mind about coming in? Maybe it was one of the new kids coming to train or chat with her?

Either way, it was time for her to head back to her room anyways. She headed into the rest room to grab her water bottle, the moment she walked into the room the door slammed shut and hit her in the back. She was knocked into the room and tripped forward. She heard chuckling behind her.

* * *

 ***Back to Marcus.***

After fiddling with it out of frustration for a few minutes, he found a few little buttons hidden on it. It was a puzzle box. Solving it was likely the only way that the magic could be used, for what it was used for is still very unclear.

Marcus was knocked out of his focus when he heard a commotion inside the building nextstore, the training house. He quickly got up and jumped down onto a window seal, then onto another before finally landing the training house roof. He jumped off the roof and landed onto the gravel road. The commotion inside stopped. He quickly entered the building and headed down the hall; but he stopped when he saw Chen walk around the corner causally with a bottle in hand and a towel around her neck. Marcus raised a brow in confusion. She stopped and smiled when she saw him.

"Are…you ok?" He tilted his head, asking uncertainly.

"Yeah, why wouldn't I be?" Chen tilted her head, frowning slightly.

"Well it's just I heard….nevermind." Marcus shrugged it off, she must have been training

"Well…since you're here, why don't you walk me to my room? I could use somebody to talk to." Chen smiled elegantly.

Marcus blinked. He then smiled and bowed, stretching out his arm in a gentlemanly manor.

"It would be an honor malady." He bent his arm for her to take.

She gave a quick chuckle and took it.

"So, favorite music?" Marcus asked as they walked out the door.

"Maria and the Diamonds." She replied

"Not sure I've ever heard one of their songs…"

"They sing "How To Be A Heartbreaker."

"Never mind, I've definitely heard that song" He chuckled.

"You?"

"Shinedown, My Chemical Romance, that kind of rock music."

"Cool!"

The two talked as they walked up the stairs, chatting about music and movies, ect.

"Well, I guess I will have to leave you here." He smiled softly.

"I ask you if you'd like to come inside, but I do have a roommate after all…" She winked playfully.

He chuckled.

She leaned in and gave him a quick kiss on the cheek. She smiled at his surprised expression and disappeared into her room. He held a hand over his cheek and swooned. He headed to his room, walking all love-drunk like, you could practically see the hearts above his head. He snapped out of his swooning when he began looking for his key, quickly realizing it wasn't in any of his pockets. He leaned his head back and groaned agitatedly, remembering that the box and his key were both still on the roof. He quickly headed back up to the roof; he found the box, but the key was missing.

"Damn it…" He went back to his room door and got out his phone, attempting to text Manny, who was likely asleep.

* * *

 ***phone***

 _Marcus D; "Hey, wake up."_

 _Marcus D; "Manny, seriously…wake up!"_

 _Marcus D; "Ok, time to start counting."_

 _Marcus D; "1"_

 _Marcus D; "2"_

 _Marcus D; "3"_

 _Marcus D; "4"_

 _Marcus D; "5"_

 _Marcus D; "6"_

 _Marcus D; "7"_

 _Tiger Mc Tiger face; "DUDE!?"_

 _Marcus D; "Hey, I guess my lucky number is 7"_

 _Tiger Mc Tiger face; "Did you lose your key?"_

 _Marcus D; "No"_

 _Marcus D;"I just misplaced it is all…"_

 _Tiger Mc Tiger face; "Damn it dude, you had one job…"_

 _Marcus D; "Just open the door…"_

Manny opened the door, he was in his p,j's and his hair was messed up, he looked very annoyed and tired. Marcus shrugged with a nervous smile, not saying anything in order not to wake up the roommates.

"Dude…." Manny whispered, almost hissing.

"I know, I know…" Marcus responded quietly.

Marcus walked into the room, door closing behind him.

* * *

 **Of course in Marcus's phone Manny would be titled as "Tiger Mc Tiger face" XD**


	8. Chapter 8 So many jokes, so little time

Frida woke up the next morning to the sound of her phone ringing; she could instantly tell it was her mom because the ringtone was "Wannable."….. Her mom really liked the Spice Girls. It was about 6:00 in the morning, so it was rather early. Frida rolled out of the bed sleepily and grabbed the phone as she ran out the door; she didn't want to rudely awaken her roommates with a phone call after all. She leaned on the railing while she answered the phone.

"Morning mom." Frida yawned tiredly into the phone.

"You sound tired, did I wake you up?" Frida's mother asked with slight worry in her voice.

"Well, it is 6 in the morning here…"

"Oh dear, I thought it was 8:30 there, it seems my calculations were off….Anyways, I've got some bad news.

"Oh no, do I have to come back home?" Frida frowned, afraid maybe her dad chicken out and wanted her back home.

"No, nothing like that. That armor that Dr. Sirvit tested on you was stolen last night from Police headquarters!"

"What?! Who did it?" Frida was fully awake now.

"We don't know, the security cameras were offline."

"Niiiiiice…." Frida groaned in annoyance.

"Your father and I thought you and your friends should know."

"Thanks mom, we'll keep a look out."

"Just be careful, ok Mija."

"Yes mom, love you."

"Love you too sweetie."

Frida hung up the phone and looked up at the early sunrise. Suddenly she heard a weird sound and the railing gave away, she screamed as the ground came rushing up towards her. She saw a flash of black and she landed on something far softer than what should have been the ground. She quickly realized somebody had caught her; she quickly turned to see who had caught her. Her eyes widened in slight terror when she saw who had saved her; it was Marcus.

Marcus was holding her. He was holding her bridal style. He was holding her bridal style and she was in her short P.J's. You can imagine her reaction was not particular calm. She quickly squirmed out of his arms in a freak out, accidently slapping him rather hard in the process.

"Woo! Well, that's one hell of a wake up!" He stumbled back and held the side his face, more surprised than anything else.

"What the hell Marcus!" Frida snapped, quickly crossing her arms over her chest in a covering manner.

"Would you prefer me to let you fell and break your neck next time?" Marcus crossed his arms and leaned his weight on one leg in slight annoyance.

"Well no…but..eerrrrr! Cover your eyes!" Frida huffed defensively.

Marcus raised a brow in confusion. "Why should I clos…" Marcus thought about it for a moment, he switched his gaze from her face to her arms; it then clicked in his head what she was being so defensive about. "Oh." He rolled his eyes.

"Come on Frida, I might be a perv **but** I got **some** decency! Besides, it's too early for me to care about that sort of thing…." He huffed in annoyance; trying to reassure her that he had better standards than that...even if that last part was somewhat a lie.

" 'Don't care, cover your eyes."

Marcus sighed in defeat and placed his hand over his eyes.

"Happy now?"

"For now..."

"Anyways, why are you up so early?" Marcus asked.

"My mom called me, tell you later when Manny's awake. Why are **you** awake so early?"

"Awww, got to wait for your fluffy knight in red scarf huh? Well I didn't sleep very well and I got board of trying, so I thought I would explore a bit."

"What was the problem?"

"Well it's just that...wait, you're not going snap at me for the fluffy knight comment?"

"Now, why would I do that?" Frida said in deviously slick manner.

Marcus couldn't see her, but he could practically hear her devious vampire smile, it sent a shiver up his spine from being creeped out.

"Well…anyhow, need a lift back to your room?" Marcus asked, trying to get over Frida's ability to switch from nice to creepy in 0.3 seconds.

"No thank you, I can manage." And with that she walked past him and headed for the stairs, he uncovered his eyes after a moment and continued his exploring.

* * *

 **SOMETIME LATER.**

* * *

It was now about 8:30. Manny had gotten up and headed outside after getting dressed, he met Frida and Marcus outside. The two seemed to be having a rather strange conversation about superhero outfits.

"I was thinking a blue or red leather vest!" Frida stated excitedly.

"How about a bikini?" Marcus snickered.

"Ha ha, very funny you perv. But seriously though, a leather vest would be cool right?!"

"I don't know, I guess? You're asking the wrong guy, I don't know anything about fashion."

"Frankly, I'm a bit surprised you don't own a leather jacket. It would suit you."

"Why does everybody say that?"

Manny hopped off the last step and right next to the two.

The curly haired boy was a bit surprised with the sight of his two friends; they weren't the least bit tired. "Wow, you two are up early!"

"Jealous?" Marcus smiled mockingly.

"No, she would beat your rear if you tried anything with her!" Manny teased right back.

She laughed and high-fived the young Tigre while Marcus huffed in slight annoyance.

"Anyways, why are you up so early? You **never** get up before 9:00 when we don't have school…" Manny tilted his head.

"Oh it's nothing; I just almost fell to my death this morning, anyways let's go get some breakfast!" Frida was **very** energized, she turned and quickly hurried for the mess hall.

"Wait what?" Manny's eyes snapped wide open as she turned away.

"Don't worry, she's fine." Marcus started to walk away as well.

Manny stood there, unmoving, for a moment in confusion and concern.

"I'm gonna need an answer on that "almost-dying" thing!" He ran after the two in comical concern.

After he caught up with the two and they had grabbed some food from the mess hall, they sat at a table and Frida explained what her mom had told her.

"Awwwww man, this is gonna bite us in the ass later, I just know it…ugggg!" Marcus leaned back and groaned in annoyance.

Manny nodded, unable to talk with a mouth full of toast.

"Jezz dude, calm down with the toast, you're like an anime character at this point." Frida joked

Manny pretended to be sad about her comment; "But, I like toast..."

* * *

 **AFTER A BREAKFIST OF EGG'S AND BISCUTS**

* * *

The 3 followed Eric to the gym; there was a wrestling styled arena inside. Jade was going to test Manny's hand to hand combat, and Eric was going to test Marcus. The mint haired girl was waiting for them on the stage, clearly ready. She had her mask on her head ready to be pulled down.

"Are you ready to spar?" She turned to the 4.

"Ok…so do we fight with our powers, or without?"

"We will use our powers for now; we are less likely to cause any serious injuries that way." She replied.

Manny activated his belt and jumped onto the stage, Jade stood at one side while he stood at the other.

"Try not to be too rough with him, he's new at this…" Marcus snickered.

"Does anything come out your mouth that's not an innuendo?" Frida rolled her eyes.

"Well…I got a wicked tongue." He clicked said tongue and winked flirtatiously.

Frida turned away in disgust, at both the pun and the perverted nature of the joke. Manny groaned loudly in annoyance from the stage and Eric was wide-eyed with horror.

"You seem far more proud of that joke that you should be…" Chen's voice called from behind them. The zebra haired girl sauntered into the room over by Eric.

"Hey there sugar," She smiled warmly at the Katana wilding boy.

"Hello there." Marcus pushed past Frida and stood next to Chen, likely to flirt while Manny was tested.

Manny returned his attention to Jade, who was in a fighting stance. Tigre shook his head and mentally riled himself up, his fierce Tigre instincts rushed through his blood and he smirked.

"Ok, bring it on!" El Tigre extended his claws in a fighting stance.

The moment Manny spoke Jade lunged hard and fast. He quickly jumped over her and avoided her punch. She turned on a dime and back handed him in the face, he stumbled backwards avoiding another hit. It was clear that Jade was strength while he was agility. He stumbled back onto the ground, but he used the motion to hand flip across the platform in order to gain distance on his opponent. She ran towards him and back kicked, he dodged to the side and flipped back, kicked her in the jaw. She stumbled backwards, disoriented at first but she quickly regained her balance. Manny jumped and did a back kick, but she grabbed his leg and slammed him into the ground. He quickly rolled away, tearing his leg from her strong grip. He quickly got back to his feet, but she grabbed him by the neck and slammed him into the ground. The second time hurt far more than the first, she definitely was built for this. Her foot was on his chest, he was sore and his heartbeat had caught up with him. It was clear she won.

"Not bad Tigre, though I think you should try to dodge more and try to tire them out first. You strike too soon." She said stoically and offered a hand.

"Thanks, but I'm not done yet." He smirked his signature evil smile and grabbed her wrist tightly. He used his sudden fun fueled adrenalin rush to fling her over his head and slam her down behind him. He quickly rolled over (using his claws as traction) and wrapped his legs around her neck in a choking manner. He held he hands away so she couldn't get him off. She struggled and it was rather difficult to keep her from clawing off his hands. After a moment she stopped trying to get away and spoke;

"Alright, I think I have seen enough." She stated very stoically, showing no signs of exhaustion.

She abruptly ripped her hands away from his grip and grabbed his wrists; she vaulted him across the stage and next to his friends, where he landed on all fours by instinct. She got off the stage and took off her mask, deactivating her super form. She hung it from her neck and slid it to her back, it was no longer viable from her thick mint hair.

"Not bad Tigre, my previous statement still stands though." She responded.

Manny shrugged in response; "Fair enough."

"Wow! You're rough!" Marcus stated, both amused and impressed.

"Ok, I think you've hit your dirty joke quota for the day there, raven." Chen chuckled warmly.

"Nah, I still got like 7 more to go." Marcus smirked.

Frida groaned in annoyance, sticking out her tongue and pointing at it like a disgusted child.

"Jealous?" The fire boy smirked.

"Heck no, she could elope with you for all I care if it keeps you from flirting with me!" Frida snapped, laughing a bit.

Mark put his hands over his heart and pretended to be hurt. "Oh, I've been shot through the heart and you're to blame!" He sang jokingly.

"Hey, Erica…err, Eric, how about I test Marcus instead?" Chen asked curiously.

Eric flinched for a split second before responding;

"Well…I guess, but why?"

"I've been dying to see if he better than just that sword of his."

Before the black haired boy could even respond, Frida knew exactly what he was gonna say;

"DON'T YOU DARE! You have made way too many innuendos already today and it's not even lunch yet!" Frida snapped at him.

"Awww, you're no fun." Mark crossed his arms and pouted.

"Well, as long as it's ok with Jade…." Eric responded.

Jade nodded in approval. Chen jumped onto the state and got on the other end, Marcus followed. They both got into their battle stances.

"Alright bad boy, show what you got!" Chen smirked and charged.

She punched but he dodged and used his leveraged to pull her over his shoulder and slam her into the ground. She grabbed his wrist and pulled him down into a choke hold.

"Well this is sudden; you could at least take me out to dinner first." Marcus snickered before hammering his elbow into her, she lost grip of him and he rolled away.

They were both quickly back on their feet.

"Don't flatter yourself honey, this is how I treat all my enemy's…" She smirked.

Meanwhile the others are just watching this flirting game with humorous annoyance. She avoided a punch and pushed him away to disorient him; Chen then twirled and back kicked him. He landed on his back but caught her leg as it was coming down for another kick. He twisted her leg so that she was forced to fall on her side. He hastily straddled her stomach and pinned her arms to the floor.

"Still flattered, I like a girl who can kick my ass from time to time." He grinned charmingly.

"Smart, you sat on my stomach so I couldn't kick you in the stomach or worse." She complemented his fighting technique.

"Well little lady, I'm more than a sword. You're gonna have to try harder than that to beat me." He smiled in a warm manner.

"Well I suppose I will…" The panda girl responded slyly.

"Ok, I think I have seen enough." Jade suddenly responded, interrupting the twos highly flirtatious courting banter.

"It is clear that Marcus can hold his own in a fight…" she continued.

"And the flirting was getting on our nerves…" Manny whisper, smirking to Frida, all too aware that Mark could still hear him.

"Hey, at least I actually try." Mark snickered, getting off of Chen and helping her off the ground.

"Not bad, not bad indeed." She smiled at him and shook his hand in an approving way.

While Chen, Frida, and Manny chatted, Marcus noticed that Eloni came into the room and whispered something to both Eric and Jade. All the blood seemed to rush from the Cheetah boys face and his eyes went wide with dread, while as Leona nodded stoically at Eloni. Marcus raised a brow, wondering what the kid could have possibly said.

Jade cleared her throat, getting the attention of the others.

"I'm afraid that there is some urgent business that Eric and i must attend to." The lion woman stated clearly.

Jade quickly headed out, Eric said a quick goodbye before scrambling after his partner.

"Well, I'm afraid I have some paper work I need to do, so I'm going to have to be leaving too…" Chen stated a bit tiredly.

"Aww, so soon?" Frida stated, she was become good friends with this lady.

"Yup, I'm afraid so. See ya later!" She gave a little wave and headed out.

"Well, what are we going to do now? Does the facility need any help with the animals?" Manny tilted his head at Eloni, who had been awkwardly standing to the side.

"Well the animals do need feeding, but that's not 'till in the evening…" Eloni responded, thinking for a moment. After a moment his face suddenly lit up; "I got an idea!"

* * *

 **Marcus is really challenging the teen rating with his jokes today XD Jeez dude, calm down XD**


	9. Chapter 9: Pool Party of Four

**Sorry for the long time it took me to wright this, school was brutal and made it hard to work, plus I got a new computer so it took a few days to set everything up. :) I hope you all enjoy! And thank you so much Mark (Storyteller54) for all the idea's and help. :D**

* * *

"You guys have a pool?!" Manny exclaimed as Eloni unlocked some wooden gates, showing of a green area with a pool of water.

"Well it's actually an enclosure for aquatic animals, like crocodiles. But we don't have any at the moment, so we can go and cool off." The purple haired boy explained.

"Awwww yisss!" Frida clapped her hands and smiled gleefully.

Marcus smiled, though clearly very tired.

"Dude, maybe you should go back to bed and get some sleep…" Manny raised a brow.

"What?! No, I feel great!" The demon powered teen responded a bit too excitedly.

Manny leaned over to Frida and whispered;

"I think he might be at that stage where he's so tired he can't feel the exhaustion."

"We better knock him out and put him to bed." Frida whispered back and the two snickered.

"I heard that." Marcus frowned in annoyance.

* * *

 **In some dimly lit tent at a secret base in the deep jungle.**

* * *

A skinny man walks into the tent, shaking a bit.

"S-sir?"

A muscular man was sitting in a chair; he had a skull mask on with reversed colors, his bright blue eyes visible from the eye holes. He had a leather jacket with no sleeves and matching pants with combat boots. The masked man stood up slowly and tilted his head, the smaller man shrunk in slight fear.

"Yes?" The older man spoke with a smooth voice that had an undertone of intimidation.

"Uh, S-sir, we f-found her." The small man spoke.

A tall woman completely covered in cloth and bandages walked into the tent. She had many strands of cloth coming from the top of her head like dreadlocks. Only her eyes and fingers were showing, she had skeleton eyes and bone claws like Django or Santana. The woman had ancient Egyptian neck brace and loincloth decorated in gold details.

The skinny little man quickly left, closing the tent behind them. The woman tilted her head and watched the masked man as he walked over to a table in the corner. The man opened a case stared inside.

"You know it was very hard to find you, the depths of Antarctica doesn't seem like the place to find a Mummy…." The man dug around in the case, the sound of glass taping against each other.

"It wasn't by my choice…" The woman spoke with a crackly yet young voice.

"Ahhh yes, I assume your sister was the one who put you there?" The man pulled out two glasses' and a bottle of some wine.

She stayed silent and watched him closely.

"A drink?" he asked, looking over his shoulder at her.

"I'm not thirsty. Now tell me, why did you free me?" The woman seemed like she was losing her patience.

"I want to offer you a deal, a trade if you will." The man stated before taking a long swig of wine straight from the bottle.

"What kind of a trade?" The mummy walked closer and tilted her head.

"Lend me some of your powers of death, and I will bring you more souls to eat than you could ever want." The man smirked.

The woman appeared to be thinking for a moment, but then her eyes twinkled, and an evil smile grew underneath her bandaged face.

"If you want my powers you will have to…. suffer a few mutations." She walked up to him in manor that was both creepy and slightly seductive. She loved to experiment on people.

"Anything to crush a certain little kitten…." He chuckled.

"I agree to your terms." She took his hand and shook it, a swirl of magic traveled across her hand to his.

He leaned back against the table and smirked, handing the bottle over to her.

"Nephthys, I do believe this is the start of a beautiful partnership." He smiled.

She didn't answer, she was too busy chugging the rest of the wine. 200 years is a long time between drinks after all.

* * *

 **Back to Manny and the gang.**

* * *

"You have a pet shark?" Manny was hanging in the side of the pool, taking to Eloni.

"Yeah, his name is Mango." Eloni sat next to the pool and was showing Manny a pic of a hammerhead shark.

"Mango?" The curly haired boy raised a brow.

"Yeah, it sounded cute."

A dark silhouette slowly arose out of the water behind Manny, it grinned evilly.

"But it's a shar-AHH." The figure grabbed Manny and laughed manically, dragging the poor boy to deeper end of the pool.

"MARCUS PUT ME DO-" Manny was cut off has Marcus back suplexed him into the pool.

Frida laughed hysterically from the other side of the pool, and Eloni simply stared wide eyed as the two boys battled it out like dogs. Frida quickly crawled onto a boulder and stood with her hands on her hips confidently. Her bathing suit was a black high rise bikini dotted with skull's.

"I am the queen of this rock, and there's nothin you sissy's can do about it!" She looked down at her two friends, who had stopped fighting for a moment.

The two boys looked at each other before smiling evilly.

"Oh, I think that there's something we can do about it..." Manny smirked up at his blue haired friend.

"Oh really? Bring it on fuzzy!" She got ready for a battle.

Manny suddenly tackled his friend into the water, where a battle started. Marcus the shook his head and laughed, he decided double teaming Frida in a water fight was way too unfair.

Marcus swam back towards the pool wall. Eloni was just dangling his feet in the water and looking at the clouds. Marcus sat on a rock in the water next to him.

"So Eloni, I'm not normally nosey, but-"

"YES YOU ARE!" Manny cut off the fire powered teen before Frida dunked her friend back into the water.

"SHUT UP!" Mark shouted back before turning his attention back to the purple haired boy as if nothing happened.

"Anyways…., what is Eric so high strung about?" Mark asked.

"Well, he has parents with high expectations." Eloni fiddled with his hands a bit, clearly a little uneasy.

"Oh, those strict kind of parents?"

"Yeah, and they might be coming to visit, which Eric really doesn't want." Eloni frowned sadly.

"Oh, well that sucks." Marcus also frowned.

"I think Eric likes it here so much because he doesn't have to risk disappointing them."

"Damn."

"Jade really is his closest friend, she's helped him through thick and thin. She's helped him come out of his shell, he was so unconfident and shy when he first came here." Eloni smiled a bit.

"Yeah, I can tell. He practically melts into a pile of happiness when she's nearby." Marcus chuckled.

The plum hared boy laughed.

Suddenly Frida gasped unusually from where the two best friends were fighting.

"Sorry!" Manny

"Watch your hands!"

"I said sorry!"

Frida laughed and tackled him, the fight continuing. Eloni leaned over to Marcus and whispered;

"Are those two….?"

"A couple? No." Mark replied.

"Really?"

"Yeah, but check back with me again in 2 months, I'll probably answer differently." Marcus snickered.

Eloni looked back at the two teen's fighting in the water, they were laughing and screeching happily. A smile grew on Eloni's face along with a quiet giggle.

* * *

 **That back suplex was Mark's idea and it is dedicated to him :D**


	10. Chapter 10 A nightmare

"Uhhhhh-"

Marcus slowly opened his eyes, blinking in the near pitch blackness of the room. He was in his bunk sleeping, or he was anyways.

"Noooo…." A voice moaned from somewhere.

Marcus stood up on his elbows and looked around the room, eye's still half shut. Eloni was out taking a nightshift, and Bingwen was sleeping soundly. The voice groaned again.

"Manny?" Marcus looked at the bunkbed beneath him.

The curly haired boy was tossing and turning, covered in sweat, his face in pain. Marcus quickly hoped down from his bed and to his friend's side.

"Manny? Wake up!" Marcus shook the sleeping teen, trying to wake him up. "It's just dream! Wake up!"

Manny's eyes snapped opened; Marcus could have sworn his friend's eyes were green, but it was hard to tell because the curly haired boy pushed him away so violently and quickly. Manny jumped out of bed with extreme panic, running for the door Mark tried to stop him.

"Manny!" Mark had to shield his eyes from a bright green light that engulfed his friend, he heard the door open and saw a tiger tail diapering into the outside world.

Marcus grabbed his boots and put them on as he ran after his friend, who clearly was not in his right mind. He jumped over the railing and saw Manny; he was in his Tigre form, and was looking around in a panic, as if he was looking for an escape.

" _I got to get out, I got to get out, I got to get out, I got to get out!"_ Manny's instincts pounded into him, holding onto him with an iron grip.

"MANNY!" Mark called out, trying to snap the wild thing back to its sense's.

Tigre ran towards a watch towered and his claws protracted, he dug them to the side and quickly started climbing to the top.

"Damn it Manny!" Marcus tried to follow his friend to the best of his ability's, but climbing like this was not his strong suit.

He climbed up after his friend, who luckily had stopped on the watch tower roof for a moment. Manny sat in a catlike position, his tail flicking madly and his ears twitching to focus in different directions. Mark was directly behind him, hidden from sight. Suddenly a loud nose came from a truck and Tigre snapped his attention in the direction. Marcus took the opportunity and pounced on his friend from behind, pining Manny's arms (and more importantly his claws) to his body. The noise Manny made in terror was so animal like that in worried Marcus a bit.

"Manny! Snap out of it!" The fire wielding boy tried to calm him, but Tigre continued to struggle and growl.

Manny struggled and tried to fight with extreme panic, it was like trying to hold on to a human sized eel made of jelly. If Mark didn't wake up his friend soon, then the boy would slip away and run off to god knows where.

"MANNY!" Mark shook his friend hard in a desperate attempt.

Mark noticed Manny's eyes; they were bright green, he had never seen the pupils so thin and shaky. Right as Manny was about to slip away, Marcus slapped him hard in the face. Manny went limp for a moment, breathing hard and staring at the roof they sat on. The tiger boy blinked and swallowed, relaxing his muscles. He looked over at Marcus, who still held a strong grip in worry that he jolt off.

"M-Marcus?" El Tigre asked, breathing hard from the stress.

Marcus let out a sigh of relief and let go of Manny.

"What the hell was that?" The fire powered teen asked, tired and a little ticked off.

"I had a nightmare…" Manny breathed out.

"Must have been one hell of a nightmare, I've never seen you so feral!" Marcus exclaimed.

"I was in dark room; I think it was a cell. I heard screaming, some animal, some human. Just, blood curdling screams of terror and pain." Manny wrapped his arms around himself, clearly very unsettled. Marcus put his hand on his friends shoulder.

"The screaming would stop suddenly, then in would continue. The screaming kept getting louder and louder until it was right next to me, then it stopped. I heard footsteps…I-I think somebody was coming to **skin** me! I felt so terrified. I had to get away…"

"Damn." Marcus breathed.

They sat in silence for a moment, allowing them both to calm down from the sudden spike in adrenaline.

"Hey, Manny?"

"Hummmm?" Turned his head slightly to look at Mark.

"You're in your Tigre form…and you didn't touch your belt."

El Tigre's eyes went wide and he swallowed nervously.

"That's never happened before…" Manny said, a little worried.

"That's ether really good, or really bad." Marcus leaned back on the roof.

"Why would that ever be good?"

"Well, if you ever are knocked out and are in danger, you could get away quickly." Mark elaborated.

"Good point." Manny replied.

"But, by our luck it's probably bad."

"Probably." Tigre agreed in a deadpan.

"HEY?!"

Manny and Marcus snapped into attention and looked over the side of the roof, the watchtower worker was looking up at them in concern.

"Uh yeah, were good!" Manny called to the man beneath them.

"Well, I'm going back to bed. I'm exhausted." Marcus got up and stretched, then he started crawling down the side of the roof. "Aren't you coming?"

"Nah." The green eyed boy replied. "I think I'll stay out here for bit…"

"Ok, whatever." And with that Marcus disappeared over the edge of the roof.

Manny sat down and looked up at the stars and thought about his dreams, wondering what they could mean. At least it was a pretty night anyways.

* * *

 **I know it's short, but it seemed like a good place to end this sort-of chapter. :/ Hope you all enjoyed.**


	11. Chapter 11 Weapons

**Some large tent at a secret base in the deep jungles of India;**

* * *

"Humans are such idiots…" Nephthys walked around a large pool of water in the middle of the room, running her claws over an ancient book.

A few men walked into the room carrying crates, clearly a little unsettled by the mummy woman. The skull masked man sat in a corner, drinking a bottle of whisky.

"But they do one thing very well…."

Two of the men dropped a crate, it fell on the ground and the lid broke off in a shower of splinters, elephant tusks and other ivory tumbling onto the ground.

"Death." She finished, smiling evilly at the tusks.

The masked man raised a brow and looked at the tusks.

"Are you sure that these have enough energy for you to absorb?"

"Well, Hern, why don't you add another soul to the well?"

The man, Hern, seemed to think for a moment, before he got up and pointed at a random worker.

"Hey, you."

The thin worker looked around nervously, hoping the masked man was pointing at somebody else.

"Yeah, you!"

The thin man stepped forward, shaking slightly.

"Y-yes sir?"

"Go get the prisoners." Hern commanded, an utterly wicked smile growing on his face.

* * *

 **BACK AT KOTA SINGA BASE;**

* * *

"Manny!" Frida's voice snapped.

Manny woke up in a startle "W-what?" he looked around the room frantically.

He realized he was in the mess hall at a table, Marcus and Frida sitting next to him.

"You fell asleep…" Frida stated.

"Oh…what was I talking about?" Manny asked groggily.

"The nightmare you had, you had just run out of your room." The blue haired girl responded.

"Oh, right!"

"and it looked like you activated your belt without touching it." Marcus added, drinking some apple juice.

"Yeah, and I ran outside. I've never felt so…" The curly haired boy paused, he seemed like he was, dare I say, ashamed.

"Scared…"

Before Frida could say anything, Jade walked up to them; she nearly bumped the table, a somewhat terrifying intensity steaming off her.

"We have received word as to where Slayer might be hiding, pack some necessities and prepare to leave in an hour." She instructed sternly and clearly.

And she left to go inform her other teammates before the 3 could say anything.

"Well that was abrupt…" Manny blinked.

"Yeah, but man am I happy we get to go do something!"

"We've only been here for 2 days…" Marcus stated is slight annoyance.

"Yeah, but I'm anxious to kick some butt!" Frida chanted.

"Yeah!" Manny stated and high fived Frida, while Marcus rolled his eyes.

"I'm surrounded by psychopaths." Mark chuckled to himself.

* * *

 **-Back at the Hern's Lair. -**

* * *

Nephthys was currently placing the ivory into the deep pool of water, while Hern was polishing a gun. Some guards dressed in camo dragged a cuffed man into the tent, the man struggled angrily, growling from behind the gage tied around his mouth. The guards knocked the man to his knees, before removing the gag.

"Y-you b-bastered!" The man coughed.

"You speak with a lot of spunk for being beaten and bloody…" Nephthys smiled evilly.

"L-let me go and I'll show y-you b-bloody!" The man was in pain, clearly. He had a black eye and cuts along his face.

"I doubt it…" Nephthys responded coldly.

Hern got up from his seat and walked over to the man.

"Now tell me agent, what brings you to my humble abode?" Hern smiled in a pompous way.

"Cut t-the crap!" The man snapped.

"Oh?"

"Y-you took me and my men prisoner!"

"That's right, I suppose I did…" The Slayer pretended to look surprised.

"J-jade will come and save us, she'll send your ass b-back to hell!" The man smiled very slightly, almost not at all.

"Well I suppose I'll have to do something about that…" Hern smiled before turning his attention to a guard. "26, you and your team have the order to go kill the prisoners."

"NO!" the man shouted before going into a coughing fit, a bit of blood coming out of his coughs.

"Well, I can't let her find you, now can I?" Hern smiled evilly.

"Y-you murd-"

A gun shot suddenly rang out, startling some of the guards. Hern had shot the man square in the forehead. The man fell to the ground in a cold, lifeless, heap.

"If you were going to say "Murder," then you were right on the money." The Slayer smirked.

* * *

 **-AT KOTA SING BASE;**

* * *

Jade had taken Frida to the weapons shed to find the girl a weapon. Frida stood carefully, amazed at all the different and unusual types of weapons. Jade opened a box and pulled out a machine gun.

"Will this be a good fit for you?" The strong woman asked.

"I don't really know how to use a gun…" Frida chuckled, a little nervously. She had never used a gun aside from her dad trying to teach her, and a machine gun seemed a bit too…murdery, for her liking.

"Perhaps a sword then?" Jade grabbed a knights sword off the wall and handed it to her, though Frida wouldn't take it.

"I don't really know how to use one of those ether…" Frida stated quietly, a little bit embarrassed.

Jade raised a brow in confusion.

"According to your records, you were once a junior police cadet, what weapon did you use then?" the mint haired girl asked.

Frida's thought about it for a moment, before her face turned red and she started fiddling with her hands.

"A stapler…" She mumbled with embarrassment.

Jade blinked, and then groaned while gripping the brim of her nose.

"Well, can you at least use a taser?" Jade asked in defeat.

"Yeah, I can do that." Frida rubbed the back of her head and smiled sheepishly.

Jade pulled out a taser from a box and handed it over to her.

"It's not the best weapon; many of slayers goons have clothes that are too thick for it to work, and you have to be in close range." Jade explained.

"Got it!"

"Now let's see what else I can give you, I'll get you a satchel bag to carry it in. I will also give you a machete and a large medpack, along with a book on dangerous wildlife. Does that sound good?" Jade raised a brow as she started to gather the supplies.

"Yeah, that will be good." Frida nodded.

A few moments later Jade handed Frida a worn army green bag, that had a tick cross body strap.

"You will be partly in charge of patching wounds; can you do that?" Jade asked with authority n her voice.

The musical girl thought about it for a moment before smiling widely and fist pumping;

"Yeah! I'm on the job, boss lady!"

Jade snorted and smiled a bit at the nickname.

"It's time to head out, let's go get your friends."

"Yeah, time to kick some but!"


	12. Chapter 12 Train Tracks

Jade, Chen, Eric, Marcus, Manny, and Frida boarded a cargo train, making sure to be quiet. Jade had helped them sneak into the train car. The plan was to ride the train until they were close to the destination, then hop off and travel through the jungle the rest of the way. Jade and Eric were keeping watch, while Chen was polishing a gun of sorts. Marcus sat down next to her.

"Semi-automatic?" He asked, leaning over to look at it.

"Yeah, filled with specially made bullets that contain long lasting slow releasing tranquilizers. One dart will knock the average man out for half a day." Chen smiled, holding up a transparent bullet filled with a purple liquid.

"Neat!"

There was a moment of silence as she polished and loaded the gun.

"So….what are your parents like?" Marcus asked a little awkwardly, trying to start a conversation.

"I don't really remember much about them, they died in a car wreck when I was pretty young."

"Oh, I'm sorry…"

She was silent for a moment before responding in a sad tone;

"It's ok, it was a long time ago."

"Well…If it's any consolation, I know how you feel." Mark held her shoulder in a comforting manner.

"I guess your parents are 6 feet under too?" Chen looked up from her gun.

Marcus looked down at the floor sadly; "Yeah…"

"Sorry, what happened?" She leaned back onto the train car wall.

"It's not important…" He leaned on a crate.

"I guess you don't want to talk about it?"

"No…" The fire powered boy shook his head slightly.

"Fair enough." Chen responded.

There was another long moment of verbal silence, the sound of the wheels running over the tracks in the background.

"Leave it to me to make it sad." The boy chuckled a little sadly.

"It's ok." She smiled a bit.

It went silent again.

"Well…I guess I'm gonna go and check on Eric and Jade." Marcus heaved himself off the floor and gave a faint goodbye smile to Chen, who went back to loading her gun.

Frida and Manny were sitting on a crate in another train car, watching the jungle roll by.

"You've been pretty quiet, are you ok?" Frida poked his shoulder affectionately

"Yeah...I've just been thinking." Manny responded quietly.

"Is it about the thing with the tiger the other day?" Frida tilted her head.

Manny fell back and laid on the crate with a soft thump.

"Yeah, and the nightmares… every time I try to get some sleep, I get jolted awake by them! And then I'm left shaky and alert for at least 30 minutes! I'm exhausted!" The curly haired boy ranted before abruptly getting to his feet to pace in annoyance.

"I am a Rivera damn it! And Rivera's are no cowards! We look danger in the face and laugh!" Manny stomped on the ground and pointed at the ceiling for some emphasis

"Come on dude, you're not being cowardly." Frida grabbed his hand and pulled him down next to her.

"Nightmares are freaky man, they don't **just** get inside your head, they **are** your head. Remember when we watched Poltergeist and feared TV's for like 2 weeks?" Frida responded, leaning into her friends side a bit.

"We were like 10."

"Still, it gave us nightmares for weeks." Frida chuckled.

"It didn't help that when we finally started to get over it, Gramps broke the satellite dish with his mech suit. I still remember how we scared the living hell out of my dad when we screamed and ran away." Manny laughed, and then blushed a little bit as Frida leaned on him some more.

"These days if any of us get sucked into a tv by ghosts, all we gotta do is call that Danny Phantom kid." Frida responded.

"Hey! I'm a better ghost hunter than that white-haired punk any day!" Marcus jokingly snapped from the doorway, making the snap their attention to him.

Marcus saw how close the two were sitting together and smirked; "I'm sorry, am I interrupting something?"

Manny's face went red and he scrambled to make distance between him and his flirty blue haired friend; "Nope, nothing at all! Come on in!" Manny chuckled nervously.

Frida scowled daggers at Marcus, who mouthed the word 'sorry' to her.

"You know, I would figure that a skilled thief would be better at lying than that." Mark crossed his arms and chuckled.

"What?! I'm not lying! THIS I SWE-" Manny was cut off by an explosion in the distance that knocked him off the crate.

"What was that?" Marcus looked in the direction of the sound and then at Frida and Manny.

The three quickly ran towards the sound, Manny activating his belt on the way. A few train cars later and they opened the door to find a huge chunk of the wall missing, Jade laying under a pile of rubble and Eric getting her out. There was an armored helicopter outside the train car, following to the best of its ability.

Jade was knocked out cold from the blast, but Eric saw the three and yelled "Were under attack!" over his shoulder.

"I'll help Eric move Jade, Manny, you and Marcus take down the Helicopter!"

The two boys didn't even bother nodding, they quickly ran towards the rather large hole in the wall, Manny grabbed Marks arm and jumped out. Tigre shot his grappling hook at the landing gear of the copter and pulled the two of them up. Manny swung his friend up and into the glass window, shattering it and landing Marcus inside.

The panicked pilot reached for a gun, Marcus pulled out his sword and swung it at the semi-automatic. There was a very quick high-pitched metallic twang, it felt like time slowed down as his sword broke in front of his very eyes. The pilot aimed his gun at Marcus again, but Manny's grappling hook punched it out of the man's hand. Marcus knocked out the pilot and grabbed the steering wheel.

"Uhhh, Manny, do you know how to fly a helicopter?!" Marcus shouted as Manny scrambled into the vehicle.

"I know how to fly a mech suit, how different can it be!?" Manny chuckled extremely nervously.

"Could we land it on top of one the train cars?!" Mark asked in a panic.

"I can't do that!"

"I thought you said you could fly a mech suit!?" Marcus snapped.

"I never said I was good at it!" Manny snapped back.

"What else are we supposed to do? if we just jump out it could crash into the train!"

"Uhhhhhhh…ummmmm….Were going to have to aim it at the ground and jump out!" El Tigre responded.

"Were gonna what?!" Marcus snapped at his friend with intense concern.

"You got a better plan?!" Manny snapped.

"…Not really, no!"

"Ok, lets DO THIS THEN!" Manny shouted, and Marcus pulled the handle a hard right and flew towards the ground.

Manny grabbed Marcus, who in turn grabbed the passed-out man and they jumped out the helicopter. Manny launched his grappling hook at the moving train and grabbed on, they smacked into the side of the train and hopped in through a window.

Manny left the pilot on the floor and the two hero's ran back to where they last saw the others. The two found their friends fighting on a flat-car. Jade, and Eric were fighting some heavily armed goons. Frida would sneak up behind a goon and taze them. Jade was absolutely plowing through them, and with the addition of Marcus and Manny it seemed like the fight was won.

Frida looked at Marcus for a moment before asking; "what happened to your sword?"

"Somebody stole it and replaced it with a brittle copy!" Marcus snapped.

Marcus looked around for a moment at all who were there;

"Wait, where's Chen?"

"She hasn't shown up once during the fight, do you think something bad happened to her? Frida asked with concern.

"I really hope no-" Eric made an abrupt gag noise and the others looked in horror as a sword pierced through his chest from the back.

The others looked in horror as they saw who was holding the blade; Chen. She smiled evilly and pulled the sword out before punching the blond boy over the edge of the flat car, sending him into the river below.

"ERIC!" Jade screamed, but before she could run after him Chen shot one of her tranquilizer bullets at her, sending the woman to her knees. It was like goons started crawling out of the wood work, they were suddenly surrounded. Everything was happening fast.

Marcus realized he was closest to the edge where Eric fell, in that quick moment he had to make a tough decision; leave his friends to get captured and save Eric's life, or stay with his friends and let Eric die. Marcus jumped of the flat car and into the river.

The train whizzed past him as he fell, the water quickly coming up to meet him, he hit the water with a large splash. It was cold and rough, he had a hard time keeping his head above water, but he had to find Eric. The kid would never survive in this water passed out and bleeding. Marcus caught a glimpse of a pale arm through the waves of water, he choked out some water and fought his way towards Eric. The arm disappeared into the green murky water and Marcus dove in after him. He couldn't see a thing, it was dark and foggy. He was worried he might have lost the kid, but he caught the glimpse of black a boot and quickly swam towards him. Mark grabbed Eric and swam to the surface, nearly drowning in the process.

"Come on Eric, wake up!" Marcus struggled to stay afloat in the wild water as he hoped Eric hadn't drowned.

After a moment of Mark shaking him, the cheetah themed hero coughed up water and breathed before passing out again. All Mark could do was hold on tight and let the river take them where it wanted to...

 **As you can all tell, I love fights on top of moving things XD And flat-cars are those train cars without walls and such, like used for carrying pipes and stuff.**


	13. Chapter 13 Things get worse

**OH RIGHT! People wanted to see Frida in a belly dancer outfit! I totally forgot DX well, either way I think I'm gonna have to put that at the end of the story X3 because Frida won't have a chance to go buy one for quite a few chapters XD**

* * *

Manny blinked, his head felt like hell and his body didn't feel so good ether. He tried to use his hands to push himself off the floor, but with the clicking of metal he realized his hands were chained behind his back. He managed to push himself up against the wall without his hands. At first, he was very dizzy and dazed, it took a moment for him to realize he was still on the train. The last thing he remembered was the sound of a shotgun, a pain in his neck, and his face meeting the ground. Frida was to his far right, she was still passed out on the floor.

He needed to find Jade, but first he needed to get out. His belt was missing so he was gonna have to get out using something other than claws. He looked around the room for anything that could be used as a lockpick.

" _Really? Nothing!"_ Manny hissed in annoyance.

He heard a groan from Frida, she groggily woke up.

"W-where the hell are we?" She mumbled tiredly.

"Were still on the train, hey, you have any bobby pins?" The boy responded.

She raised a brow; "Bobby pins?"

"I need to something thin and hard enough to lockpick my way out of these cuffs."

Frida thought hard for a moment before her face lit up; "I got a lock pic in a special hidden pocket!"

"hidden pocket…?" The boy replied very warily.

"Yeah, in my goggle strap!" Frida responded cheerfully.

" _Oh thank god…"_ Manny was mildly terrified that the secret pocket was going to be in her underwear or something.

Frida started moving around wildly and headbanging, trying madly to get her goggles off her head. It was a very freaky site, she would put the girl from The Ring to shame. After a moment her goggles hit the ground and she kick them over to him. He somehow manages to twist and grab them with his hands. (after doing a lot of silly wiggling.) He fiddled with it for a moment before finding the lockpick and setting himself free. He quickly went over to Frida and unlocked her cuffs.

"Ok, so we need to find my belt and then Jade….. annnnnd I honestly don't know what to do after that." Manny chuckled nerviously.

"Well I don't got a better plan, so that will have to do." Frida laughed for moment before turning back to serious.

The two peaked through the train-car door; Chen was discussing something with a tall muscular man who was wearing all black, and a skull mask that had reversed colors. Manny's skin went cold and his hair stood on end. It…it was the man from his nightmares. The man wasn't just from a terrible dream, he was real. This was not ok.

The Tigre belt was laying on a table next to the wall….behind the two.

The only way they were going to get the belt, was for Chen and the man to leave the room. That was not going to be easy…The two hid back behind the door again.

"Ok, on the count of three I'll get their attention, you go get your belt."

"Frida, no wait-!" Manny hissed.

"One, Two, annnnd-" She gave a quick confident wink to her friend "Three!" She whispered and ran into the other room, making a screeching noise as she went.

Chen and the Man snapped their attention to the blue haired girl. Frida headed for the other door, her plan was to make them chase her, but Chen grabbed Frida's wrist and pulled her into a headlock. But before Chen or the man could react further, there was a bright green light behind them, they turned around to see El Tigre standing proudly on top of the table, tail swishing fast and ready to attack.

Frida headbutted Chen and knocked her back before turning around and punching at the panda themed girl, but she dodged. The two started fighting, Chen pushing the other into another room.

Manny used his grappling fist and launched it at high speeds towards the man's head, but the man grabbed the fist out of the air easily. He used the chain to pull Tigre towards him, punching him in the stomach. hard.

Winded, Manny coughed. No way this man was human, no normal human had that kind of a strength.

The man used the opportunity to slam his fists on Manny's back, smashing the boy into the ground. Red energy glowed from the man's fist, Manny quickly rolled over and out of the way as the fist smashed into the floor a few inches from his head. The man had punched clean through the wood floor, denting the iron beneath. Electrical red energy sparked from the spot. Manny launched his grappling hook on a wall and pulled himself away, just as the man slammed another punch into the ground where Manny's head had been.

* * *

 **-Back to Frida vs Chen -**

* * *

Frida tried to punch Chen, but to no avail; "You're not nearly skilled enough to beat me in a fight, give up already! Maybe you'll live if you do!" Chen punched Frida in the side of her face, knocking the girl back.

"Just shut up!" Frida rubbed her newly formed black eye and grabbed a metal poll off the ground and swung it like a bat at the girl.

Chen shifted to the right and stepped close to Frida, before kneeing the girl in her stomach, then Chen kicked her across the room into some crates. The blue haired girl groaned in pain and rolled over, she was covered in cuts from the splintered wood.

Chen walked over and smirked evilly. "Like I said; no skill." She kicked Frida in the head, knocking the girl out.

Chen began to walk away when something slammed into her head from behind. Chen fell to the ground, knocked out hard. Frida was standing behind the panda girl holding a broken wooden plank.

Frida dropped the plank and chuckled at her unconscious enemy; "Heh, just like your sister." She wiped some blood off her mouth. "Now, where's my tazer…?"

* * *

 **-Back to El Tigre.-**

* * *

The man had slammed Manny by his neck up against the wall, the boy's claws dug into the man's arm as he tried to breathe, drawling blood, but the man didn't seem to care or even notice.

"A pathetic child such as yourself shouldn't have the power of that belt…." The man continued choking the boy, a smirk under his mask.

The man suddenly let go and shook violently for a moment, he turned to see that the little blue haired pest from earlier had tazed him. Manny struggled to get his breath back as he laid on the ground coughing. The man growled at her and pulled out the tazer points.

"Really, are you so weak that you must rely on this human to help you?" The man chuckled to El Tigre darkly.

"What the hell do you think I-" Manny was cut off when the man kicked him in the stomach.

"Leave him alone!" Frida struck the man with a broken table leg, he didn't even flinch.

The man backhand smacked her across the room and into the wall with a loud thump.

"DON'T TOUCH HER!" Manny jumped up and launched at the man.

The man was surprised by the kid's sudden strength, he punched the kid out of instinct, his fist covered in glowing red electricity. His fist hit Manny's chest and there was a bright red light mixed with green, Manny screamed in terrible pain. There was the sound of cracking. The forced knocked El Tigre through the wooden walls of the train car and out into the jungle below.

"MANNY!" Frida screamed in terror.

The man looked at his fist in slight surprise; "That was a bit more power than intended, but I suppose I needed the practice. What a shame though, I would've liked to have that belt…"

"You'll pay for that you son of a-" Frida was interrupted as the man held her up by her neck.

"Lucky for you, I have better uses for you alive than dead…for the moment anyways." The man chuckled darkly, staring straight into Frida's terrified blue eyes.

* * *

Manny hit a branch, and then another one, and then another one, before hitting a hill, where he rolled off the end of its cliff and onto a large slab of rock with a hard thump. His vision was blurry, and his bones felt like they had just been rearranged by a wrecking ball. He tries to move, but his body simply is too sore and in pain to listen. He's barely conscious. Something rustles in the bushes ahead of him, but he's in no condition to care. He starts to fall unconscious, his blurred vision blinks in and out, the last thing that he sees is the glow of gold eyes staring at him through the foliage.

* * *

 **I hope that the fight scenes make sense, I was a little brain tired while writing them XD Sorry for the short chapter, but it seemed like a good way to end this chapter. :/**


	14. Chapter 14 Waking up

**I just wanted to say, that Marcus is wearing a t-shirt with one of those explorer/adventures vests that have all the pockets. It's too hot in India too wear a normal jacket XD**

 **I've been waiting to do this chapter for a while, and I'm so happy to finally get to wright it X3**

Eric stirred. The last thing he remembered was a blur of pain and water. He was swaying slightly, his chest was hurt less, but he was still quite sore. Actually, his head was being supported by something. He struggled to open his eyes, blinking in the dim evening light.

"Oh good, you're waking up. I was starting to get real worried." He heard Marcus say.

Eric blinked a few more times, he looked around and realized what had happened; Marcus must have dove into the river to save him, and then carried him away. Eric clutched at his own chest when a ghost pain hit him, he realized that he was wearing Marcus's vest. Marcus had ripped up Eric's shirt to make some makeshift bandages, Eric's eyes snapped wide and he freaked out. He squirmed out of the others arms and onto the damp ground, holding his arms across his chest in a defensive manner.

"Whoa, Whoa, calm down!" Marcus put his hands up slightly to show he meant no harm.

"Y-you can't just-now you-my chest—and-You shouldn't have!" Eric stuttered in a mess of words, not sure what to say. His face wide eyed with panic and his face red with embarrassment.

"What was I supposed to do? Leave the wound to bleed out?" Marcus asked carefully, not snarky.

"But…you're a known perv!" The blond sputtered.

"I'm a perv not a creep! Trust me, ogling was the last thing on my mind while patching you up." Marcus stated, trying to calm his friend down.

"Besides, I'm a perv to lady's, and you're a guy, right?" The black-haired boy gave a warm accepting smile and offered Eric a hand.

Eric blinked and thought for a moment and gave a small and sheepish, yet happy smile; "Yeah…" Eric took the hand and the other helped him off the ground.

There was a moment of verbal silence, aside from the stray sounds of birds and other animals in the jungle around them.

"So…ummm…where's my binder?" Eric rubbed his arm awkwardly.

"You're still wearing it, I used it to hold the bandages in place."

"Oh." Eric looked down his vest to see it, in his dazed panic he didn't notice it.

"So…could you please not tell anyone?" The Cheetah kid asked nervously.

"Wasn't planning on it, it's not any of my business." Marcus responded nonchalantly.

Eric smiled; "Thank you."

Marcus shrugged; "Just basic respect." And then he smiled.

Another moment of silence, though not filled with an awkward feeling this time.

"So I guess we need to follow the train tracks...Which we still need to find first." Marcus stated, unsure.

"I know Jades scent pretty well, I can follow that and lead us to her. Frida and Manny likely won't be too far from her." Eric responded with determination.

"Scent? OH, right! I forgot about the 'cheetah senses' thing for a sec there." Marcus exclaimed.

The blond boy smiled, his tail swishing behind him for emphasis.

"So what kind of dangers do I need to look out for in the jungle?" Marcus asked as they started walking.

"Basically, any snake, there are a lot of venomous ones in India."

"Fantastic." Marcus groaned.

"Poisonous bugs, like tarantulas."

"Ich."

"And Mosquitos can carry deadly viruses."

"I'm beginning to wish I had packed some bug spray into my pocket this morning." Marcus gave a half chuckle.

"And there are the larger animals, but I can calm down and connect with most of them. Though crocodiles are still very dangerous, I'm not very good with socializing with them. Jades much better with connecting to them than I am." Eric continued.

"Connecting?"

"Yeah, that's what Jade tried to teach Manny to do with the tiger the other day. I like to call it 'connecting.' It's sort of like befriending/calming down an animal though that weird mystical object that gives one their animal powers. It's an emotion kind of thing." Eric explained further.

"Oh."

"So, elephants, tigers, and leopards I'm pretty good at connecting with."

"Ok, if I see any of those I'll let you handle them." Marcus chuckled.

The two started to head upstream to where the train tracks were.

Manny groaned, his body hurt like hell. It was nearly pitch black, he was laying on a cold hard slab of rock. His cat eyes quickly adjusted to the dark; he was in what looked to be an old temple, clearly abandoned for decades. He sat up, groaning in pain as he did. Everything hurt.

He blinked and looked around, he saw something stir in the corner of his vision. His's eyes went wide. There was a tiger laying across from him, staring at him. He jumped up against the wall, quickly regretting it as pains hit him everywhere.

He stuck out his hands to extend his claws, but he couldn't, he looked at his hands and realized his gloves were missing. He looked down at himself and realized he was in his normal cloths.

" _What the hell?"_

It was like he was stuck half way in-between his Super form and his normal self.

" _Aww great what the hell is this about?"_

Manny snapped his attention back to the tiger when he noticed movement, a little cub wiggled out from underneath her head. It waddled over to him and made a weird breathy noise at him (a chuff) and tilted its head.

"You better not sick you mom on me…" Manny mumbled, well knowing the dangers of an angry mother.

The mother tiger also made one of those breathy noise's, it _seemed_ friendly enough. Manny wasn't sure quite what to do, his body was in no condition to fight, and it's not like he was better off running into the dark jungle. Manny cautiously sat back down, the tiger cub scrambled over and sat in his lap.

"Uhh, hi there, hehe…please don't get me killed." He chuckled nervously.

The tiger looked over at him for a second before putting her head on the ground.

The boy settled in his spot, as much as his brain told him to be highly cautious, he surprisingly didn't feel in danger. And honestly, he was too tired to fully care or do anything about it in the first place. Manny blinked slowly, he could hear it start to rain outside. He laid his head back on the wall and began to drift off to sleep. He needed sleep, and his body was going to get it even if there was a dangerous predator in the room.

As it started get dark Eric could smell rain on the wind, the two were currently in a tree hiding in a tree, shielded from the rain by the canopy.

"So, Eric…I hear that your parents are coming to visit Kota Singa." Marcus asked carefully.

"Yeah…I really wish they wouldn't."

"I'm guessing that they don't know about you being trans?"

"No, they don't. I was a girl the last time they saw me, now I'm a boy. They get stressed about the superhero thing enough as it is, they might just try and drag me home over this." Eric groaned in annoyance and ran his hand through his hair.

"Your parents transphobic?" Marcus raised a brow.

"Well, my mom likely wouldn't care, granted she likely would still buy me dress's and such, but that's not so bad. She just likes making everything as pretty and girl as possible." The blond chuckled a bit, but then he frowned sadly.

"My dad….well, my dad has said some rude things about trans people in the past... He's quite a stick man to boot, it's difficult to change his mind, and my mom tends to follow his lead. She's never been good at making her own decisions, no confidence, she would follow whatever he said." He continued

"Oh…I'm sorry to hear that." Mark frowned.

"I don't know how I could hide it from them! I could still pass as a girl, but everyone at the base calls me "he" or "him," how would I stop that?" Eric stressed.

Marcus patted the kid's shoulder; "Well, I would tell you to be proud of who you are and just tell them, but I don't really know. I can't tell you what to do, I might just make things worse. I'm sorry."

Eric sighed, his tail swished in annoyance; "Man, this week keeps going from bad to worse."


End file.
